Optimal climate policy is studied in a Ramsey growth model with exhaustible oil reserves, an infinitelyelastic supply of renewables, stock-dependent oil extraction costs and convex climate damages. Weconcentrate on economies with an initial capital stock below that of the steady state of the...

This paper applies an economic model of climate change that is based on endogenous substitution of energy resources to determine the effect of advances in renewable technology on aggregate and sectoral fossil fuel use and energy prices. It uses a Nordhaus type partial equilibrium model of the...

In the domain of desertification and climate change an important amount of new knowledge and research material has been obtained from the many projects carried out in the EU-DG12 Environment and Climate programme. However, so far little effort has gone into making this scientific material...

Climate change is one among the major global issues of the twenty first century. Anthropogenic activities have led to notable changes in the earth’s climate including increase in the global temperature over the 20th century by 0.6 ± 0.2oC at an average rate of increase of 0.17 oC decade since...

As the implications of anthropogenic climate change are better understood the pressure builds for more effective legal and policy responses at national and international levels. With climate change looming as an existential threat, climate change law ought not to be characterised merely as a...

We develop a policy model which unlike the Clean development Mechanism (CDM) allows the economic agents in developing countries to generate and sell "certified emission reductions" (CERs) through environmentally progressive investment. It is shown that such a system encourages investment in...

California's Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 limits California's greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in 2020 to their 1990 level. In 2006, three studies were released indicating that California can meet its 2020 target at no net economic cost - raising questions about whether opportunities truly...

This article explains why states and localities need to be full partners in a national climate change effort based on federal legislation or the existing Clean Air Act. A large share of reductions with the lowest cost and the greatest co-benefits (e.g., job creation, technology development,...

The Green Paradox states that, in the absence of a tax on CO2 emissions, subsidizing a renewable backstop such as solar or wind energy brings forward the date at which fossil fuels become exhausted and consequently global warming is aggravated. We shed light on this issue by solving a model of...

A number of publications, both books and articles, have appeared in recent years attempting to prove that there is a correlation between global climate change and the collapse of complex human societies. This paper addresses a possible exception the the idea of global effects. While societies...